Wednesday, October 16, 2019

Serious Prison Reform Could Boost the Russian Economy, Gallyamov Says


Paul Goble

            Staunton, October 13 – If conditions in Russian prisons were significantly improved, Abbas Gallyamov says, such a development could lead to an improvement in the investment climate because businessmen, risk takers by their nature, would not be constrained as many are now by the fear that they could be confined in horrific conditions.

            Instead, if conditions in Russian prisons were better, the former Putin speechwriter and current Moscow commentator says, business people would see the risk of landing in them as less threatening and would be prepared to take more risks, something that could lead to an improvement in the Russian economy (echo.msk.ru/blog/gallyamov_a/2518007-echo/).

                Today, Russian prisons are so awful that businessmen feel an “existential” dread of landing in them, “but now imagine what would be the case if the businessman was certain that whatever happened, he would have hot water, a normal toilet, a good library, daily walks, and that no one would torture or denigrate him, neither fellow prisoners nor the guards.”

            The Kremlin can’t do much about how the police, the FSB or the investigation committee do their jobs, but it can easily impose order on the federal penal system. It might not be able to change things everywhere over night; but it could do so in prisons to which businessmen in Moscow might be sent.

            To bring the Russian prison system up to world standards could easily become “the main national project, if you will, the only one that would help enliven the economy of the country,” Gallyamov says. To that end, he suggests, the Kremlin should name Gref or Kudrin to head the federal penal system and make that system directly subordinate to the president.

            In that event, the Moscow commentator argues, Russian businessmen would change the calculations they make, take more risks, and reap more benefits for themselves and the country --even if some of them still were to end up behind bars.

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